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Full-Text Articles in Disability Law
The Part And Parcel Of Impairment Discrimination, Michelle Travis
The Part And Parcel Of Impairment Discrimination, Michelle Travis
Michelle A. Travis
The Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments Act of 2008 (ADAAA) has been heralded for restoring the protected class of individuals with disabilities to the broad scope that Congress intended when it enacted the original Americans with Disabilities Act over two decades ago. But the ADAAA accomplished something even more profound. By restricting the accommodation mandate only to individuals whose impairments are or have been substantially limiting, and by expanding basic antidiscrimination protection to cover individuals with nearly all forms of physical or mental impairment, the ADAAA extricated disability from the broader concept of impairment and implicitly bestowed upon impairment the …
Impairment As Protected Status: A New Universality For Disability Rights, Michelle Travis
Impairment As Protected Status: A New Universality For Disability Rights, Michelle Travis
Michelle A. Travis
This Article analyzes the fundamental change to federal civil rights law that Congress accomplished through the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (the "ADAAA"). Congress enacted the ADAAA in response to a series of United States Supreme Court opinions that had narrowly interpreted the definition of disability in the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. Although many commentators have recognized the ADAAA's intent to restore the class of individuals with disabilities to the breadth that Congress originally intended, this Article argues that the ADAAA accomplished something more significant: it extricated disability from the broader concept of impairment. As a result, the …